By Kevin Eurich
I receive my copy of The Valley Reporter via snail mail so I’m always a little late on the uptake, but I’m old-fashioned enough to like the feel of a newspaper in my hand. I more or less scan the headlines and read further if interested enough. Being away from Vermont, The Valley specifically, I no longer have a dog in the fight, as they say, so I typically look for things of historic value. I’m delighted that my good friend, Kathy Mehuron, has undertaken the project called, “Take Me Back,” which covers visual, verbal and written history of The Valley. I contributed to her many works with a book called, “Once Upon A Time In The Mad River Valley.” My family roots go deep within Waitsfield, Fayston and Warren. I have seven generations (Moriarty/Bowen/Baird) on my maternal side and four on the paternal side (Eurich/Long/Richardson).
I am fortunate to have many old photos from both sides of the family and parents who told me of the family history. Top that off with a grandmother (Marietta Bowen Baird 55 years as an organist at what now is Waitsfield United Church of Christ, formerly Waitsfield Federated Church) who was a genealogist sharing stories often enough it was if I knew my ancestry personally. She turned her work over to my mother and I eventually inherited the much-coveted genealogy. I purchased some very powerful software called “Family Tree Maker” and transposed her work into cyberspace and then commenced years of research to build on her beginnings including adding to what she had already researched. That’s a long-winded way to explain my innate fondness for the history of family and The Valley in which they lived.
Through my years of gathering anything historical related to The Valley I reviewed maps of Warren, Fayston, Moretown and Warren, all published around 1875. These maps showed all the roads at that time along with names populated where Valley residents had lived. I set out to find and walk the roads that long ago were thrown up and no longer used. It is within my makeup to take slow walks along these ancient roads and wonder who lived in the cellar holes I’d come across and would picture people traveling via horse, horse and wagon and horse and sleigh. For me, it was a fulfilling exercise to, seemingly, step back in time, if only a nostalgic trip within my mind. I’ve walked just about all of the old Warren-Roxbury Mountain Road; the road from Route 100 by Warren Falls that connected to the Fuller Hill Road and I’ve walked much of the old stage road that was routed in the upper regions of the land coming from Ward Hill, through Fayston and on to Warren. These are a few of old byways that can still be found.
The Valley that I knew has morphed into what we see today and most of the names I knew are gone now. That is how life is, but I think it necessary for the newer citizens of our Valley to visit the history available, thanks to people like Kathy Mehuron and those contributing to her historical work. To know The Valley from the past is perhaps a way to protect The Valley of the future and have some personal knowledge of what was.
Happy Trails or should I say old roads and such!
Kevin Eurich
The Valley and now North Myrtle Beach, SC
